While this is termed "the largest academic scandal to hit the Ivy League school in recent memory," it is not the only one in recent memory.

From Business Insider | 08/31/2012 |:

More than 125 Harvard University undergraduates are being investigated for plagiarism and other academic misconduct surrounding final examinations, according to Bloomberg News.

The incident is the "most wide-spread cheating scandal" known to rock Harvard, school officials told Bloomberg News. - http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2924964/posts

In 2001, Harvard was focused upon as part of a controversy in which high, but allegedly unwarranted, GPA's (Grade Point Averages) were awarded. While in 1940 C-minus was the most common GPA at Harvard, and in 1955 only 15 percent of undergraduates had a GPA of B-plus or higher, in the year 2000, 50% in of all the grades given were As or A-minuses, with just six percent being C-pluses or lower. More than 90 percent of the class of 2001 had earned grade-point averages of B-minus or higher.

Observers point out that entering freshmen typically have straight-A averages in high school, SAT scores near 800 in all fields, and have demonstrated an unusual ability to engage in serious study. The days when Harvard included many "Gentleman C" students there for social activities are long gone.

In a Harvard Crimson article, noted conservative Harvard professor Harvey Mansfield contended that "Grade inflation got started when professors raised the grades of students protesting the war in Vietnam..." "At that time, too, white professors, imbibing the spirit of the new policies of affirmative action, stopped giving low grades to black students, and to justify or conceal this, also stopped giving low grades to white students." The problem was essentially seen as the predominance of the notion of self-esteem, "in which the purpose of education is to make students feel capable and 'empowered,' and professors should hesitate to pass judgment on what students have learned." Such assertions resulted in no small controversy. - Ross Douthat, "The Truth About Harvard," The Atlantic Monthly March 2005 ; adapted from his book, Privilege: Harvard and the Education of the Ruling Class (http://www.conservapedia.com/Harvard_University#cite_note-17)

Besides the recent scandals above, how many students could pass (not me) if they had to obey HARVARD LAWS OF 1642

1. When any Schollar is able to Read Tully or such like classicall Latine Author ex tempore, and make and speake true Latin in verse and prose suo (ut aiunt) Marte, and decline perfectly the paradigmes of Nounes and verbes in the Greeke tongue, then may hee bee admitted into the College, nor shall any claime admission before such qualifications. [like modern SAT scores, such a requirement indicated the level of education one had received, and achieved. This served a practical purposes of course, as copies of Scripture and other classics were also still mostly in Greek.]

2. Every one shall consider the mayne End of his life and studyes, to know God and Jesus Christ which is Eternall life. Joh. 17.3. [Today, personal as well as intellectual ignorance of the Biblical Christ abounds among Harvard students.]

3. Seeing the Lord giveth wisdome, every one shall seriously by prayer in secret, seeke wisdome of him. prov. 2.2,3 etc. [Instead, Harvard today militates against such Biblical wisdom , and peity. Today, if any activity is done "in secret," it is fornication (1 out 4 women have an STD).

4. Every one shall so exercise himselfe in reading the Scriptures twice a day that they bee ready to give an account of their proficiency therein, both in theoreticall observations of Language and Logicke, and in practicall and spirituall truthes as their tutor shall require according to their severall abilities respectively, seeing the Entrance of the word giveth light etc. psal. 119, 130. [The goal here was to produce "able ministers of the New Testament" (2Cor. 3:6), "rightly dividing the word of truth" (2Tim. 2:15). Today, the Bible is almost wholly abandoned as the literal and authoritative Word of God, and the very deceptions Harvard was founded to prevent abound therein!]

5. In the publicke Church assembly they shall carefully shunne all gestures that shew any contempt or neglect of Gods ordinances and bee ready to give an account to their tutors of their profiting and to use the helpes of Storing themselves with knowledge, as their tutours shall direct them, and all Sophisters and Bachellors (until themselves make common place) shall publiquely repeate Sermons in the Hall whenver they are called forth. [Rather than this being the goal of Harvard, the inculcation of unBibical worldviews is fostered, and rare is the professor who would dare declare the Biblical gospel and morality, or the student who could or would do likewise.]

6. they shall eschew all prophanation of Gods holy name, attributes, word, ordinances, and times of worship, and study with Reverence and love carefully to reteine God and his truth in their minds. [This is of little to no concern in Harvard today, rather the "faith once delivered" (Jude v.3) is little esteemed, and if one comes into Harvard with such faith, he will be sorely challanged to keep it! Sports, college parties, etc., not Bible studies, are what students mostly flock to.]

7. they shall honour as their parents, Magistrates, Elders, tutours and aged persons, by beeing silent in their presence (except they bee called on to answer) not gainesaying shewing all those laudable expressions of honour and Reverence in their presence, that are in uses as bowing before them standing uncovered or the like. [Rather than promoting reverence toward authority, Harvard has joined the bulk of other "Intititutions of Higher Learning" in fostering rebellion toward those who represent just authority, under the guise of protesting injustice, and in such protests reveal their own dearth of wisdom which usually comes with age.

8. they shall be slow to speake, and eschew not onely oathes, Lies, and uncertaine Rumours, but likewise all idle, foolish, bitter scoffing, frothy wanton words and offensive gestures. [Today, if one would dare uphold Bible truth and morality at Harvard, such as reproves the like of irreverend Peter Gomes, he/she will see quickly how the above law has been abandonded].

6
posted on 02/02/2013 8:31:20 AM PST
by daniel1212
(Come to the Lord Jesus as a contrite damned+destitute sinner, trust Him to save you, then live 4 Him)

The problem with our educational system is that it teaches majors which have no practical use (many not even teaching thinking skills), and there are too many extracurricular activities. Students pick schools which are country clubs, and leave with huge debts. Many cannot get jobs after four to six years of living disorganized, jet-lagged lives.

There is almost no religious presence on most campuses, and most of the social life harms the character and personal integrity of students.

The Harvard class is one which pre-law students would take, many intending on a career in politics; so it is only natural that they would start cheating early.

I don’t understand why one would bother to cheat at Harvard (it’s impossible to get less than a “B” in class without not showing up the entire semester and then shooting the professor) especially for an “intro to Congress” class.

That is because you are not as smart as they, according to those who ascribe to the school of the devil who seeks to “climb up some other way:”

Harvard alumnus and author Ross Douthat attributed this problem partly to socioeconomic differences, and noted that “Harvard students are creatively lazy, gifted at working smarter rather than harder”, being brilliant largely in their tactics “to achieve a maximal GPA in return for minimal effort.” - http://www.conservapedia.com/Harvard_University#cite_ref-17

13
posted on 02/02/2013 8:38:15 AM PST
by daniel1212
(Come to the Lord Jesus as a contrite damned+destitute sinner, trust Him to save you, then live 4 Him)

Oh, let’s be honest - you don’t go to Harvard or Yale for a good education: that can be had in almost any university. You go to those institutions because you want to get ahead, to develop the attitude and make the connections and carry the name that will lead to positions of wealth and power. Honesty and integrity are obviously no longer required in such positions in our society, so why should we expect honesty and integrity among those attracted to such institutions?

17
posted on 02/02/2013 8:51:02 AM PST
by dagogo redux
(A whiff of primitive spirits in the air, harbingers of an impending descent into the feral.)

You are going to love this story! There was a girl in one of my son’s classes that cheated during a midterm. Guess how the teacher knew? Well, not only were all the answers exactly the same BUT she actually wrote the other student’s name on top of her paper. Bwahahaha! What a maroon!

First, because you just refuse to study or read any of the class material, so after ten weeks...you’ve learned nothing.

Second, your professor is a loser, and you can’t learn from the idiot...but he makes these 100-question tests where the answers could be viewed in different fashions.

I had some idiot that a community college had hired for a semester. This individual was a bone-digger for a dinosaur site and the grant money just plain disappeared, and her friends got her this teaching job on geology. I realized twenty minutes into the class that she just basically read from the book and knew almost nothing on geology. She’d spend half of each lecture talking up the act of digging dinosaur bones....which had nothing to do with the class. At the end....I could not imagine how the test would work except for the two-page hand-out she gave the week prior...which had almost every answer listed, and I passed only because I read the hand-out.

My Dad,a Depression baby who grew up in the Irish slums of South Boston ("Southie",to us natives) never went to college (*far* too poor in the 1930's) but wound up managing numerous Harvard and MIT grads during his career.Her used to joke,particularly,about the Harvard guys although he respected them in reality.He used to say things like "if you can't go to college,go to Harvard"..."you can always tell a Harvard man,but you can't tell him much"...and "how do you like your oysters? Raw,raw,raw".

And that was back when a Harvard degree meant that you had actually *accomplished* something.

23
posted on 02/02/2013 8:58:32 AM PST
by Gay State Conservative
("Progressives" toss the word "racist" around like chimps toss their feces)

Too late for Ted Kennedy and Al Gore to leave Harvard retroactively. I think if the truth were known, Harvard is just a name or brand and there are dozens of US small universities that are far superior to Harvard academically. I know that one Harvard student I worked with was only superior in only one category and that was arrogance.

Yep. An Ivy League degree in lots of disciplines is now a red flag for a soulless climber.

I worked for 20 years at one of Harvard Medical School's largest teaching hospitals.The physicians there...both the junior and the established ones...were considered the cream of the crop.Graduates of Harvard...Yale...Columbia...Stanford...Johns Hopkins,you name it.Among the junior doctors we always tell the Harvard grads from all the others because *they* could talk,non-stop,for 4 hours about the uvula but were clueless if you handed them one of those pop up umbrellas.

28
posted on 02/02/2013 9:07:03 AM PST
by Gay State Conservative
("Progressives" toss the word "racist" around like chimps toss their feces)

They should just have said they were only doing what they thought useful in case they wanted to run for Senate from Massachusetts some day. Of course, they’d also have to change their names to “Edward Kennedy”, but that’s easy to do.

One night about halfway through the term, in a statistics class, the instructor came to class drunk. He then regaled the class with how the class was all BS and we'd never use what he was teaching.

I and several others complained to the university. He was fired the next day, the class cancelled, and our tuition for the class was refunded. I didn't bother to take the course again. He was right about the course.

As many as 60 students have been forced to withdraw from Harvard University after cheating on a final exam last year in what has become the largest academic scandal to hit the Ivy League school in recent memory.

Good news for the Dems....that's a veto-proof majority.

33
posted on 02/02/2013 9:54:04 AM PST
by Half Vast Conspiracy
(Based on a letter from an 8 year old school is now illegal cuz its yuckey and dumb".)

With regard to almost all undergraduate courses, you will not “use” the subject matter of the course later in life. The purpose of these courses is not to transfer knowledge to you, as in so many facts or even so many tools, because all of that in available for free or nearly so, from the internet or in old-fashioned books. With a few exceptions (e.g., accounting, nursing, engineering, elementary school teacher), the purpose of an undergraduate education is for you to develop your ability to think for yourself. Hence, “liberal education,” as in being a free person, able to decide for yourself.

As for what an undergraduate course in statistics should involve, it should enable you to deal with the mass of data that comes like a flood from the real world. To discern tendencies from oddities, to deal with phenomena having multiple causes, and with relationships in which both X and Y are causes and effects of each other.

The reason you have to solve some problems in a statistics course is not so you can save money not having to buy a computer. It’s to demonstrate you have grasped the material being covered. It could be that you really understand the meanings of central tendency and dispersion; but, if you are unable to demonstrate that understanding, I don’t know what an educational institution can attest to your understanding. Ideally, in a program of study, you (a) learn to master the standard tools of analysis of particular disciplines, (b) learn to apply those tools of analysis to relatively simple real-world situations, and (c) learn to integrate knowledge from multiple disciplines in relatively complex real-world situations.

I am sorry that you had an asshole for an instructor. Many colleges and universities are headed by people from the humanities who themselves are oblivious to complex phenomena such as we who are in social sciences, medicine, business and other such disciplines deal with. These administrators think statistics can be reduced to so many formulae, and can be taught by foreign graduate students who have difficulty speaking English, when all “gen ed” courses should be taught by faculty who have deep knowledge of their discipline.

A 2009 survey of almost 30,000 high school students nationwide found that 30% admitted to stealing from a store within the past year (19 percent who attend religious schools). 23% said they stole from a parent or relative. More than 83% stated they lied to a parent about something significant. 42 confessed that they sometimes lied to save money (up from 395 in 2006). 64 percent had cheated on a test in the past year (up from 60 percent two years earlier) and 38 percent had cheated more than once. More than 36% had used the Internet to plagiarize. 26% also confessed to lying on at least one survey question. However, 93% agreed, “I am satisfied with my own ethics and character,” and 77% affirmed , “When it comes to doing what is right, I am better than most people I know.” Josephson Institute http://charactercounts.org/programs/reportcard/

A survey of 6,000 academic psychologists resulted in 10% reporting they had falsified research data; 67 per cent selectively reported studies that worked; 35% said they had doubts about the integrity of their own research. Leslie John, George Loewentstein, and Drazen Prelec in Psychological Science, December 2011

A lot of this is due to the fact that post-secondary education has moved away from developing a students love of learning and into awarding diplomas based on tests passed.

&&&
No, a lot of it is due to the fact that these jerks never learned from their parents that it is wrong to lie and to cheat. For many in their generation, honesty is for suckers.

It is most troubling to see how much cheating is taken so casually these days. In my college years, it never even occurred to me to cheat, and I am pretty sure most of my classmates were of the same mind.

Recently, I had a 40ish father that I know brag, in the presence of his children, about how he used his calculator to cheat when he was in high school.

The best and the brightest apparently don't need to cheat. Perhaps they just do it so well that they don't get caught. The cheating that I see is usually so lame that I feel embarrassed for the student.

I sense that a lot of students have difficulty reading well enough to garner the information necessary to be successful in college. They can read, but not well. It must be an awful feeling to be at such a disadvantage that they feel compelled to cheat. Not every cheater is a lazy slacker. Some, I suspect, are feeling truly desperate.

My wife's a professor and assigns lots of papers, take-home essays, etc. She'll sit on the couch grading papers and notice a phrase or sentence that seems too well written or uncharacteristic of some particular student. She sticks the sentence into Google and up pops the document they plagiarized.

I agree. I went to a very small, Catholic high school. The geometry teacher was a nice man.. he just wasn’t a good teacher at this subject. There were kids who did cheat on the tests. One way was to have a cheat-cheat (a piece of paper with notes) and it was taped inside the front part of the school uniform skirt. You sat down, flipped your skirt over/up and presto... notes. The girls felt safe because what male teacher (at that time) was going to ask you to flip your skirt up!

Some of the students that I currently see struggling with a subject don’t have the money (or the parents don’t) for a private tutor. The school doesn’t really assist much with tutoring. Thus, they may feel trapped.

A drunken professor is truly a horror story. Funny thing is that the statistics and methods courses I took as an undergrad and in grad school probably were the best part of my college education. Skills that I use regularly.

The college president of our little school said only one thing that I remember over 35 years later. Paraphrasing him, "The value of a liberal arts education comes from being able to recognize bullshit when you read it or hear it."

He phrased it more artfully, but it made an impression on me and turned out to be true. Even courses that don't seem important, if well taught, help develop the critical thinking and evaluative skills that prove valuable later.

“Suspensions depend on the student, but traditionally last two semesters and as much as four semesters.”

Where I went to college, you were EXPELLED for cheating. So Haavaad only has you go home and work in a supermarket for a year or two, and then you go back and all is forgiven. Most likely during that time, the student will take some transferable classes at home - so the effect will be minor.

In my day, professorial alcoholism was a given. In your case, in vino veritas. Instead of getting the poor bastard fired for telling you the truth, you young jackanapes should have gone to the dean and told him that the course was academically worthless and demanded your money back without involving the dipso Professor.

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